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I wrote a letter to Gov. Rick Scott not as a Republican, a Democrat or a member of any political party.

I am an independent voter and simply a very concerned resident of this great state.

I have no alternative but to appeal to the governor as head of the state to personally intervene on behalf of the safety and protection of all citizens.

Many are beginning to call Florida the new Selma of the South, and I think that we can both agree that is not a title that any governor wants as a legacy.

It is no secret that the state’s Stand Your Ground law is frowned upon by many around the country. This law is unclear and grants biased individuals a license to kill as long as they claim that they felt in danger.

I fail to comprehend how teenage boys without weapons can be a danger to a man with loaded weapons, but those are matters for the courtroom, I suppose.

I asked the governor how many more young black lives must be lost before his office stops defending Stand Your Ground and begins standing for children?

How much longer shall these injustices continue before he intervenes?

How much longer shall the parents of African-American boys fear their sons dying over what others fear?

He deplores the loud music without giving thought to the insensitive nature that it reflects.

I am sorry that his statement did not express a similar concern for the conditions that contributed to the death of Jordan Davis.

As a resident of this state, I urged him to support suspending Florida’s Stand Your Ground law until the Legislature can work out the kinks that exist during the next legislative session.

Without SYG some of these incidents may not have occured at all. People who may have, in the past, retreated from a confrontation now feel emboldened to stand their ground thereby escalating the situation from what may have perhaps been a shouting match into an assault or a homocide. SYG removes the defendants duty to retreat which is a requirement in most self defense cases. The major problem with SYG is when the defense ops not to invoke it, yet because it is state law, every judge has to bring it up during each set of jury instructions. In cases where the defendant makes a declaration of self defense, the jury deliberation should be based purely on the self defense claim, taking into consideration the duty to retreat. Throw SYG into jury instructions and you may be letting someone who could not prove a self defense claim not only deprive the victim of justice, but also turn the victim into the criminal. Tallahhassee could us a dose of Thomas Paine right now as it seems it is void of common sense.

1 in 20 people in Duval county have a CCW, there are hundreds of thousands of other responsible weapons owners that do not have a license.

Everyone legal gun owner in the state are responsible gun owners on the idea that they do not go out and shooting other people on a regular basis, even when angered.

2013 census has Florida population at 19,317,568, which is the 4th largest population in the United States.

864,263 of those live in Duval County I can assure you if biased individuals used defense as a license to kill only to claim they felt in danger there would be a whole more dead bodies and a lot more people for Corey to over charge.

Cornelius D. Jones your rant is unfounded and without merit and THE LEGISLATURE will do nothing to change a really great law!!!

BTW instead of writing the Gov. why not spend more time researching how many, what race and event was used in the name of self defense and see if the name "Selma" ever held true for Florida. Im sure you will find that is also without merit but uninformed people like you enjoy perpetuating the hatred and lies.